


Purpose

by tarathepotato



Category: Original Work
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Androgyny, Chronic Illness, Emotional, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Genderless, Happy, Illnesses, Lost - Freeform, Melancholy, Sick Character, please give feedback, sick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-08
Updated: 2017-06-08
Packaged: 2018-11-11 07:07:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11143368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarathepotato/pseuds/tarathepotato
Summary: A piece of writing that I had to produce for a school assignment that was without any restriction in content, however had to remain under 1000 words.Apologies for any missed grammatical errors, but as this is my first piece of work on AO3 I love any and all feedback.P.S. the main character is purposefully given no gender or character description apart from a chronic illness, this is so that YOU, the reader can assign whatever features you wish <3enjoy~!





	Purpose

**_Purpose (An Original Work)_ **

 

I remember sitting in the doctor’s office, being scared for reasons I wasn’t even sure i completely understood. I remember my mum’s eyes welling up with tears as my father consoled her. I remember being absolutely clueless that I had just been diagnosed with something that would permanently affect my life. Being told at the age of 8 that I had a condition that would render my muscles useless by the age of 30 was life-changing, I guess I had just always taken it for granted. I spent 15 years growing up in fear of being left unable to walk or run at a later age. For younger me the concept of being bound to a wheelchair by the time I was 30 was simply incomprehensible. I remember sitting at home one day, really just feeling sorry for myself, I was browsing the internet and wading through articles about medical miracle cases, strong people who battled through their illnesses and came out completely able-bodied. I always made a habit of hoping that somehow, maybe if I used my muscles enough, i’d be able to become like the people from the online articles that I read so often. I picked up a hobby, I started going to the gym and really focusing on using and bettering my muscles while I still had most of their function. By my last birthday, my 23rd birthday, i was left with only 50% muscle strength in my legs, and it was at this point that I was being forced to lessen my physical activity.

 

Doctors had informed me that through my constant pushing of my own physical strength I had held the condition off for just a little longer, however they were heavy hearted when it came to the bad news. I sat in that doctors office yet again, my parents absent, distracting my fingers with a loose thread on my shirt. The doctor told me that although I had pushed my symptoms away for so long, I could expect rapid decline in my muscular function within weeks of dropping my regular routine. There was no way around it, so there I sat, scared just as before. I was instead scared because I understood. I understood the implications of what the doctor had to say, and it was at this moment I realised why my mother cried as much as she did for me when I was younger. It crossed my mind, that for a split second perhaps giving up would be so much easier and more practical than holding onto something which would just drag the inevitable and slow end of my condition further forward. I thought of all the things that I would be missing out on theoretically if my muscles were to give way at that particular instance, and each time I brainstormed I always came back to one idea. I’d be missing out on adventuring and exploring, venturing to places that only the human body can go, places a wheelchair wouldn’t be welcomed. I looked back to my doctor and asked him some questions.

 

“Do you think I could travel? you know like, see the world?”

 

“I think it’s best if you stayed closer to your specialists… being so far away could mean that if an accident were to occur you would have to be seen by doctors who knew nothing about you, and I don’t think that’s a logical risk to be taking” The doctor seemed remorseful to pass this news onto me.

 

“Oh… I understand” I was solemn and felt my voice crack part way through.

 

My thoughts were racing, to know now that it would be so unlikely for me to see the world while I still had an able body caused so much conflict in my head.

 

The appointment was finished yet I still had so many unanswered questions, most of which I doubt my doctor could even begin to answer.

 

Once I was outside of the clinic I didn’t know where to go, at this point in my life i’d had my whole life turned around on me for good. So I wandered.

 

I wandered through some crowded streets, next to people who didn’t even know my name.

 

I wandered through some shady alleys, between tall buildings that towered over me.

 

I wandered until my feet hurt and my legs ached for me to stop, at the door of an old, weak, abandoned house.

 

Its frame reminded me of my own body, broken and in some parts molded away. It gave a strange comfort, an off-kilter warmth. I pressed my hand at the door, a long creak as it let itself open.

I sauntered slowly through the dilapidated hallway, which probably once saw a family or loving home thrive once before.

A room at the end of the corridor, with its door painted a faded gold, seemed to draw me closer, a sense of unexplainable comfort coming from what secrets lay behind it.

I close my eyes and continue forward, my blistered ankles begging “no more”. The sweat on my brow from a hot 32 degree summer’s day inching its way down my face.

For some reason I stop just to take a breath, like I expect something waiting on the other side. I close my hands and grasp the handle as if i’m greeting the house “hello”.

The door sweeps away from me, the vintage yellow staining the walls within greeting me in return.

A full size mirror sits in the sun, on the wall directly ahead of me, the light coming in from outside giving it a spotlight glow.

I walk up to it, words scratched into it at the sides:

 

_This house that once stood proud, crumbles down as everything it’s ever known is taken away._

_May this house stand a thousand years more to find its new purpose._

_For no house loses its reason, just as with the people within._


End file.
